Two years ago I lamented that I wanted to know more about this neighbor’s house in Maine but didn’t want to bother the people who lived there. Luckily, The Boston Globe Magazine did, so I was able to learn all about it and get some great peeks inside here. I knew that house was special, it even made the cover! I just wonder how the heck The Boston Globe managed to find our tiny little island of Spruce Head.

I think I truly mourned when G.F. McGregor’s in Rockland Maine closed. You know how you find that very small handful of shops in your life that truly inspire you? They are curated and merchandised to perfection, and you just want to move in? That was how I felt about G.F. McGregor’s, but yesterday, I found a shop to fill the void.

My aunt bought some gorgeous Thomas Paul pillows for our family place in Maine (much to my chagrin, as I could have ordered them at DP), but when I asked her where she’d found them, she sent me to fourTwelve Home in Rockland. Formerly just the clothing and accessories boutique, the shop acquired the space next door and opened up a home store.

Home Goodies to the left, Clothing to the right…hey, there’s my Mom!

This shop combines just the right combination of historical preservation and regency glamor. The original wooden floors are painted light gray with a tiny hint of green/blue in it. The original exposed brick walls are painted white. The ceilings are covered in white tin tiles, and the exposed pipes are painted white. That’s where the the old patina shows through; everything else is shiny and fresh. It is a perfect balance. There are fabulous light fixtures hanging in a line down both halves of the store, there is oversized floral wallpaper in the dressing rooms along with benches, there are gorgeous mirrors and mirrored furniture, there is a large velvet ottoman in the boutique (it looks like it came straight from Nanette Lepore’s closet), and there are little peacocks peeking out at you here and there from the tops of shelves.

Included in the home items were John Derian decoupage, Jonathan Adler vases, Thomas Paul pillows, Bob’s My Uncle sea life plates, emu furniture, funny books, gorgeous soaps and bath items, those cool Caspari long match matchbooks, and a fun array of letterpress cards. It’s a perfect stop for accessorizing one’s own home or for picking up a great gift for just about anyone for any occassion at any price point.

By the way, among all the great articles of clothing they had in there, I kept pulling out the cutest pieces and they were all by Beth Bowley, whom I hadn’t heard of before. It turns out she is the owner, a Parsons grad, and she launched her clothing line in 1998.

Overall, the decor reminded me of the jewelry available in the store. The newer lines are very delicate, and handcrafted from silver and gold. In addition, they have a wide array of vintage pieces that are unique with some hints of funk and a few well-earned signs of age. It’s a new inspiration I know I’ll keep in the back of my mind whenever I am decorating.

One of my favorite museums is The Farnsworth Museum in Rockland, Maine, and it was there I first discovered the work of Alex Katz, whose studio is nearby in Lincolnville. I wandered into a room and watched a movie of this man painting birch trees on a huge canvas. I loved watching his energy and how quickly he was able to assess which move he was going to make next. I can’t really describe it better than Sanford Schwartz does in this book:

Katz has always been so clear and forceful about his goals, and those goals are such a fine blend of the naturalistic, the abstract and the theatrical, that literally where he works can seem a little beside the point. But the possibility that, in some slight degree, Lincolnville lets him connect with a freer self adds a wrinkle of feeling to the pictures he makes there.

I was perusing Maine Home and Design the other day and fell upon an ad for an architecture firm I just love. Van Dam Architecture and Design does absolutely beautiful and thoughtful work, with careful consideration of site, context, and materials in each project. You can check out more images here, and here are a few of my favorites:

A friend of ours up in Maine told us where he was working on a house so we went and checked it out. At the edge of the forest where the dark, moss-covered spruce trees meet the cliffs of the rugged coastline, Marty’s house is perched on a bunch of footings. The house was built, I believe, in the sixties, and the renovation was more for safety than anything else. Most of the original feel appears to remain – it seems like a modern Scandanavian kit house, and it has such a perfect relationship with its sublime site. These were the best pictures I could get from outside on the deck of a place that’s private property, check them out:

Our Company

Community

Happy Customers

"I just discovered your site yesterday (and I'm already ordering from it!) I even forwarded it on to a friend. I was giving up on finding bedding that I liked, so it's nice to know there are others out there who appreciate a mod(ern) sensibility. And your rugs are too die for!"